Elon Musk Denies Reports He Is Firing Twitter Employees To Avoid Payouts

Twitter's new owner Elon Musk has denied a New York Times report about laying off Twitter employees at a date earlier than Nov. 1 to avoid stock grants due on the day.

Twitter's new owner, Elon Musk, denied a New York Times report that Twitter laid off employees on a date earlier than November 1 to avoid awarding the shares due on the day.

Asked by a Twitter user about the layoffs, Musk tweeted: "This is wrong."

The New York Times reported on Saturday that Musk had ordered job cuts at the company

, with some teams trimming more than others and layoffs to occur before the November 1 date, when employees were due to receive stock grants as part of their compensation.

Citing anonymous people familiar with the matter, the paper reported that the cuts may start as soon as Saturday.

According to media reports on Saturday,

Musk has fired top CEOs in an effort to avoid massive severance payments, with other workers laid off as soon as Saturday.

Musk fired Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal, and Director of Legal and Policy Vijaya Jade, upon finalizing a high-profile $44 billion purchase of the social media platform Thursday,

People familiar with the matter told Reuters.

He accused them of misleading him and misleading Twitter investors about the number of fake accounts on the platform.

According to research firm Equilar, executives will receive severance payments totaling about $122 million.

Quoting anonymous people familiar with the matter,

The Information reported that Elon Musk had terminated four senior Twitter CEOs, including Agrawal and Segal, for "cause," in an apparent attempt to avoid severance pay and unearned stock awards.

In a tweet on Saturday, LightShed analyst Rich Greenfield said Musk had fired senior Twitter executives "for some reason,

Prevent vesting of their unvested shares as part of a change of control.

Twitter did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Reuters was not immediately able to contact the dismissed executives.

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